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1.        Child Health Day

            Gray Whale migration begins along the west coast of the United States to Baja,California, Mexico.  Why do whales migrate?  Off season rates in Cancun?  Bullfights? the Orson Whales film festival?

            331 BC - At the Battle of Gaugamela, Alexander the Great defeated Darius III of Persia. Alexander began his war against the Persians in 334 BC. At the time the Macedonian leader was twenty-two years old. At his death eleven years later, Alexander ruled the largest empire of the ancient world. His victory at the battle of Gaugamela on the Persian plains - near Tel Gomel, east of Mosul in northern modern-day Iraq -was a decisive conquest that insured the defeat of his Persian rival King Darius III.

            1207 – Happy Birthday, King Henry III of England. One of the more obscure of the eight Henrys, Henry was the son of King John.  When John went kaput in 1216, Henry was nine years old.  He would reign until 1272. Learning flourished, particularly at Oxford, where Robert Grosseteste and Roger Bacon inspired many by their pursuit of knowledge and their championing of the natural sciences. Many magnificent buildings were erected, including Salisbury Cathedral and Westminster Abbey. Otherwise, Henry’s reign was a political failure and foreign policy disaster.  He was succeeded by his son, Edward I, one of England’s great kings.

            1814 - Opening of the Congress of Vienna, intended to redraw the European political map after the defeat of Napoléon the previous spring. Guided by Prince Klemens von Metternich of Austria, (the “Coachman of Europe”), the decisions of the congress would affect Europe and the world to this day.  France was deprived of all territory conquered by Napoleon. The Dutch Republic was united with the Austrian Netherlands to form a single kingdom of the Netherlands under the House of Orange.  Norway and Sweden were joined under a single ruler.  Switzerland was declared neutral.  Russia got Finland and effective control over the new kingdom of Poland.  Prussia was given much of Saxony and important parts of Westphalia and the Rhine Province.  Austria was given back most of the territory it had lost and was also given land in Germany and Italy (Lombardia and Venice). Britain got several strategic colonial territories, and they also gained control of the seas.  France was restored under the rule of Louis XVIII.  Spain was restored under Ferdinand VII

            1816 – Happy Birthday, Ernst Werner von Siemens, German electrical engineer who played an important role in the development of the telegraph industry. Siemens Company was founded in Berlin by Siemens in 1847.  Siemens' name has been adopted as the SI unit of electrical conductance, the siemens.

            1847- Maria Mitchell, the first woman astronomer in the United States discovered a comet. The discovery of a comet wasn't a rare event in the nineteenth century, but women astronomers were very rare. In1865 she was appointed professor of astronomy and director of the observatory at the newly founded Vassar College.

            1869 - Austria issued the world's first postcards. A copyright on a private postal card was issued to John P. Charlton of Philadelphia in 1861, and was later transferred to his fellow townsman, H.L. Lipman. Theearly cards, decorated with a slight border pattern and labeled "Lipman's postal card, patent applied for", were for sale until 1873. The Austrian cards required a postage stamp. Roland Hill of Great Britain created the first postage stamp. On May 6, 1840, the British Penny Black stamp was released. The Penny Black was engraved the profile of Queen Victoria's head, who remained on all British stamps for the next sixty years. Rowland Hill created the first stamp. And, oh yes, vocabulary fans, postcard collecting is called deltiology.

            1880 -The first electric incandescent lamp factory in the U.S. was opened in Menlo Park, N.J. The Edison Lamp Works. This proved to be a very illuminating experience. In 1879, Thomas Edison discovered that a carbon filament in an oxygen-free bulb glowed but did not burn up for 40 hours. Edison eventually produced a bulb that could glow for over 1500 hours.  An electric current passes through a thin filament, heating it until it produces light. The enclosing glass bulb prevents the oxygen in air from reaching the hot filament, which otherwise would be destroyed rapidly by oxidation.

            1890-  An act (we have gotten so used to their overacting) of Congress created Yosemite National Park, nearly 1,200 square miles of mountainous terrain in the Sierra Nevada of California.It is the home of such natural wonders as Half Dome, Yosemite Sam, “varmints”,  and the giant sequoia trees. Environmental trailblazer John Muir and his colleagues campaigned for the congressional action, which was signed into law by President Benjamin Harrison

            1891- Happy Birthday William Boeing, airplane manufacturer. In 1914 Boeing believed he could build a better plane than those currently in the air, he enlisted his engineering friend, George Conrad Westervelt, to design and build the B&W, a twin-float seaplane. Encouraged by this first effort, Boeing decided to begin his own plane-building company, Pacific Aero Products. He renamed it the Boeing Airplane Company the following year.

            1904- Happy Birthday, Otto Robert Frisch, Austrian-British nuclear physicist, born in Vienna, who, with his aunt Lise Meitner, described the division of neutron-bombarded uranium into lighter elements. He named the process fission.  Yes, he had “gone fission”.  Frisch did further work on fission, collaborating with Rudolph Peierls in confirming Niels Bohr's suggestion that a chain reaction would be more likely to result with uranium–235 rather than with the more common isotope, uranium–238. After much work Frisch came to the basic conclusion that an “explosive chain reaction” could be produced with a pound or two of uranium–235 rather than the tons of it which he first thought would be necessary. Frisch and Peierls were probably the first two people in the world to be aware not just of the possibility of a nuclear bomb but of its practicality.

            1903 – The Pittsburgh Pirates of the National League defeated the Boston Americans of the American League 7-3 in the first official “World Series” game at Huntington Avenue Grounds in Boston, MA Nine years earlier, the two top teams in the National League competed in an experimental post-season championship in which Boston beat Pittsburgh five games to three. Deacon Phillippe pitched a six hitter and right fielder Jimmy Sebring hit the first home run in World Series history. The Americans would defeat the Pirates five games to three. In 1908, the Boston players donned red hosiery and played under the name "Red Sox."

            1908 - The Ford Model T car, the first car to be made on an assembly line, was introduced for a price of $825.  This "very special 'Sales Event' also featured employee equivalent discounts, show rooms filled with happy people looking at cars as if they were sculptures at MoMA,  and manufacturer 'cash-back incentives." Henry Ford is believed to have said “you can paint it any color as long as it’s black”. In the Model T's nineteen years of production, its price dipped as low as $280. Nearly 15,500,000 were sold in the United States alone.

            1910 – Happy Birthday,  Bonnie Parker, American bank robber. Born in Rowena, Texas, she met up with Clyde Barrow in 1930. Together, they led police on a nation-wide crime and killing spree starting in 1932 and ending in 1934 with their deaths. Faye Dunaway played Bonnie Parker in the 1967 movie Bonnie and Clyde with Warren Beatty. The 4’ 11” Bonnie and lover Clyde were toodling along in a stolen car on May 23, 1934 when At approximately 9:00 a.m. a posse, concealed in the bushes waited in ambush. The posse's official report had Clyde stopping to speak with a colleague’s father, planted there with his truck that morning to distract Clyde and force him into the lane closest to the posse, the lawmen opened fire, killing Bonnie and Clyde while shooting a combined total of approximately 130 rounds. By 9:15, the couple were dead.

            1924 – Happy Birthday, James Earl “Jimmy” Carter, born in Plains Ga., the thirty ninth President of the United States.  Carter had the distinction of being the first president to be born in a hospital. 

            1936 -During the Spanish Civil War, (Republicans vs. Fascists) General Francisco Franco was named head of the rebel Nationalist government in Spain. It would take more than two years for Franco to defeat the Republicans in the civil war and become ruler of all of Spain. He subsequently served as dictator until his death in 1975 – his lingering, extended dying process was made even more famous by comedian Chevy Chase on the Saturday Night Live television show, who would announce weekly, “Francisco Franco is still dead.”

            1940 - The Pennsylvania Turnpike, often considered the first superhighway in the United States, opened to traffic. It was built on the right of way of a failed railroad construction by William Vanderbilt in 1884. The original roadway was 160 miles long, running from Irwin, just east of Pittsburgh to Middlesex, just west of Harrisburg, Pa. This 160 mile piece of roadway, however, revolutionized automobile travel in the United States. The Pennsylvania Turnpike was the first roadway in the United States that had no cross streets, no railroad crossings, and no traffic lights over its entire length.

            1946- Twelve high-ranking Nazis were sentenced to death by the International War Crimes Tribunal in Nuremberg. Among those condemned to death by hanging were Hans Frank, Gauleiter of Poland since 1939, Wilhelm Frick, Minister for Internal Affairs, Hermann Goering, as Prussian Minister for Internal Affairs created the Secret Police, which later developed into the Gestapo. He was responsible for the mobilization of the economic resources of the Reich for rearmament, Alfred Jodl, Wehrmacht General and advisor of Hitler in strategic and operative matters, Ernst Kaltenbrunner, head of the Security Police (SD). Alfred Rosenberg, Gauleiter for occupied territories in the East;

Fritz Sauckel, who orchestrated the forced labor programs in occupied Europe, Wilhelm Keitel, General Field Marshall, Arthur Seyss-lnquart, Gauleiter of the Netherlands; and Julius Streicher, founded in 1923 the virulently anti-Semitic Nazi weekly newspaper Der Stürmer. Fittingly, their bodies were taken to Dachau where they were cremated. Seven others, including Rudolf Hess, Adolf Hitler's former deputy, were given prison sentences ranging from 10 years to life. Three others were acquitted.  Hermann Goering committed suicide the day before his planned execution by swallowing a cyanide pill. On 16 October 1946 the ten remaining defendants were hanged

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Holocaust/verdicts.html

            1957- The infamous drug thalidomide was first marketed in West Germany and shortly sold in at least 46 countries, including the U.S. It was first synthesized in 1953 by Chemie Grünenthal, as a sedative, but it seemed  like a wonder drug for pregnant women to combat symptoms associated with morning sickness. Unfortunately, after thousands of women had taken the drug,  it was found that the drug's  molecules crossed the placental wall, especially during the first trimester, affecting the proper growth of the foetus. Worldwide, over 10,000 babies were born by the early 1960's with substantial birth defects, including deafness, blindness, internal disabilities, cleft palate, deformed or even missing limbs. Believe it or not…it’s back.  In 1998, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the drug thalidomide (Thalomid) as a treatment for a severe skin disorder

            1983 – Bonnie Tyler made her contribution to enhance science knowledge as her song, Total Eclipse of the Heart reached number 1 on the Billboard Charts. People who were heretofore ignorant of the meaning of the word eclipse increased their science vocabulary by one more word.

            2005- Islamic terrorist suicide bombers attacked  three restaurants in two tourist areas on the Indonesian island of Bali, a popular resort area. The bombings killed 22 people, including the bombers, and injured more than 50 others. This was the second suicide-bombing incident to rock the island in less than three years. In 2002,  Islamic terrorists set a series of three bombs killed 202 people, many of them foreign nationals in Bali on vacation, including 88 Australians.  

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2         1263 – Scotland vs. Norway and the world trembled. In the battle of Largs, Scottish King Alexander III defeated the Norse army of King Haakon by luring Haakon's fleet far from its bases. He induced it to come up into the trap of the Firth of Clyde. He held off action until the inevitable equinoctial gales forced much of Haakon's fleet on the shore by Largs. He then attacked and forced King Haakon back to sea, and back to his base in Orkney, where he died. 

            1452 – Happy Birthday,  King Richard III of England.  Poor Richard, whose history was written by Tudor sympathizers, and was immortalized by William Shakepeare as the evil hunchback – Elizabeth Tudor was Queen at the time- has been treated poorly by history. Richard was the last Yorkist king of England, whose death at the Battle of Bosworth effectively ended the Wars of the Roses with Henry Tudor becoming Henry VII.  He has become infamous because of the disappearance of his young nephews, the sons (Edward V and Richard) of his brother Edward IV- the “Princes in the Tower” who disappeared after Richard claimed the throne following Edward IV’s going kaput.  Recommended reading – Daughter of Time by Josphine Tey.

            1535 - Jacques Cartier discovered Montreal, Quebec. He visited the Casino, climbed Mount Royal, complained that everyone spoke a different French than  that spoken in France, and attended a Canadiens hockey game.  The French navigator was  first explorer of the Gulf of St. Lawrence and discoverer of the St. Lawrence River. He made three voyages to the region,

            1608 - First refracting telescope was demonstrated to the Netherlands States General by Hans Lippershey. "Here’s what you do, you look in this end and it makes stuff that is far away look closer". In 1609, Italian scientist, Galileo Galilei learned of Lippershey's device and began constructing his own, eventually increasing the magnification to a factor of 20. He soon discovered the 4 moons of Jupiter (note: there were A LOT more yet to be discovered.) A refracting  telescope uses a lens to gather and focus light from a distant object. A reflecting telescope uses a mirror to gather and focus light from a distant object.  Lippershey who applied to the government of the Netherlands for a patent in 1608. Eventually, the patent was denied. The government thought that the device could not be kept a secret.

            1800 – Happy Birthday, Nat Turner who led a slave rebellion in 1931. On August 20, 1831, Turner and six other men met in the wood and  went to the home of Turner’s master. They killed his master's entire family. Then they went house-to-house, killing other whites. In the process, they gained the assistance of fifty to sixty slaves who helped kill at least 55 white people.  The rebellion ended when the militia began pursuing Turner and the other slaves. During the pursuit, some slaves were captured and about 15 were hanged. Turner escaped and hid out for about six weeks until he was captured. He was imprisoned, and was sentenced to execution on November 5, 1831. On November 11, 1831, he was hanged and skinned.

             1832-Happy Birthday, Julius von Sachs a German botanist. He demonstrated the importance of transpiration in plants and the role of chlorophyll.  His discovery was the "Joy of Sachs" or....."Sachs in the City". Badabing.

            1836 -Charles Darwin returned from his voyage on the HMS Beagle  (see Sept. 16 for Galapagos landing) to the Pacific. He was convinced of the idea that all organisms, including humans, are modified descendents of previously existing forms of life.  Darwin’s ideas developed in two stages: the realization that organisms are not fixed and unchangeable and to provide an explanation of the process of evolutionary change.  It would be 23 years before he published Origin of Species.

            1852- Happy Birthday, Sir William Ramsey, Scottish chemist who discovered the "inert " or noble gases; neon, krypton and xenon, and co-discovered argon, radon, calcium and barium. “We have come to praise cesium, not barium”. Ramsay received the 1904 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. In a chain reaction of discovery, In 1892 Ramsay's investigated  Lord Rayleigh's observation that the density of nitrogen extracted from the air was always greater than nitrogen released from various chemical compounds. Ramsay then set about looking for an unknown gas in air of greater density, which—when he found it—he named argon. While investigating for the presence of argon in a uranium-bearing mineral, he instead discovered helium, which since 1868 had been known to exist, but only in the sun. This second discovery led him to suggest the existence of a new group of elements in the periodic table. He and his coworkers quickly isolated neon, krypton, and xenon from the earth's atmosphere…..and before you know it, you had OxyClean…..

            1866 – The tin can with key opener, like you see on sardine cans, coffee cans, and even tea,  was patented by J. Osterhoudt in New York City. Note: we’re still working on what his first name was, all references (in the cannibalistic world of the internet refer to him as J.) The first tin cans were so thick they had to be hammered open. As thinner cans were manufactured, it became possible to invent dedicated can openers. In 1858, Ezra Warner of Waterbury, Connecticut patented the first can opener.

            1869 - Happy Birthday, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi - Mahatma Ghandi, Indian practitioner of passive resistance and the moving force behind Indian independence from Great Britain. "Mahatma" is a phrase derived from Sanskrit words meaning "great soul."   Mahatma Gandhi was assassinated on January 30, 1948, shot at point-blank range by Nathuram Godse, an activist of the Hindu Mahasabha.

            1886- Happy Birthday, Robert Julius Trumpler, Swiss/American astronomer who moved to the US in 1915 and worked at the Lick Observatory. In 1922, by observing a solar eclipse, he was able to confirm Einstein's theory of relativity. Relativity -  “ Yup, now it looks like my Uncle Ernst, and now it looks like Cousin Awilda, and now it looks like my mother-in-law on a bad day… and now……”

            1890 -  Happy Birthday, Groucho Marx, American comedian and actor. Groucho, who deviated from the Marxist-Leninist orthodoxy, played the mustached, cigar-chomping leader of a foursome of brothers, alternately dispensing humorous invectives and puns while acting as exasperated straight man for his brothers' loonacy; Chico (Leonard), the monumentally stupid, pun-happy Italian; Harpo (Adolph), the non-speaking, madman; and Gummo (Milton) (later replaced by Zeppo –Herbert-), the hopelessly lost straight man in some of the funniest movies ever made; A Night at the Opera, Duck Soup, Horse Feathers, A Day at the Races, The Cocanuts, and Animal Crackers. “Last night I shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got in my pajamas, I’ll never know”.  “Your eyes, your eyes, they shine like the pants of a blue serge suit. That’s not a reflection on you—it’s on the pants.”

            1895 – Happy Birthday, Bud Abbott, American comedian and actor . Straight man for Lou Costello…..”Who’s on first?”

            1906- Happy Birthday, Willy Ley, German-American engineer who was a founder of the German Rocket Society. The society was the first group of men (with the sole exception of Robert Goddard) to experiment with rockets. Ley even got  Wernher von Braun into the society. Ley was consultant for the science fiction film Frau im Mond in which the countdown from ten to zero was introduced. He was vehemently anti-Nazi, unlike Von Braun and in 1934, he emigrated to the U.S. rather than cooperate with the development of rockets for military applications for the Nazis.  In the U.S., he became a popularizer of space exploration and travel, writing many popular books such as The Conquest of Space and Beyond the Solar System.

            1908 – Cleveland Indians pitcher, Addie Joss pitched a perfect game beating the Chicago White Sox 1-0. Joss had the shortest career of any player in the Hall of Fame playing only nine seasons, all with Cleveland.   During spring training of 1911, Joss fainted on the field in an exhibition game. He shrugged the incident off initially. Within a week, however, Joss was hospitalized with tubercular meningitis, and on April 14, 1911, he died.

            1917 – Happy Birthday, Christian René de Duve, Belgian cytologist and biochemist who discovered lysosomes and peroxisomes. Lysosomes are the cells' garbage disposal system. They degrade the products of injestion.  Peroxisomes are organelles that contain oxidative enzymes. They may resemble a lysosome, however, they are not formed in the Golgi complex. Peroxisomes are self replicating, like the mitochondria. de Duve shared the 1974 Nobel Prize for Medicine, with Albert Claude and George Palade

            1919- President Woodrow Wilson, who had just cut short a tour of the country to promote the formation of the League of Nations, suffered a near fatal stroke. Wilson had collapsed in Pueblo Colorado after traveling 8,000 miles in 22 days.  He returned to Washington and suffered his stroke.  Wilson's stroke left him physically incapacitated but his condition was not made public. His controvercial second wife, Edith Wilson jealously guarded her husband, and later claimed hat his resignation would sap his will to live. To her he was "first my beloved husband whose life I was trying to save ... after that he was the president of the United States." As a result, his Cabinet members were denied access to him. His wife decided what printed materials he could see, and his state papers became few and unsatisfactory.  Vice President Thomas C. Marshall of Indiana would have become President on Wilson’s resignation. The process for declaring a President incapacitated was at that time unclear, and Marshall was fearful of the precedent that might be set in establishing one The country was virtually leaderless until the inauguration of Warren G. Harding in 1921. After leaving office Wilson retired to a house on S Street in Washington, D.C., where he lived in virtual seclusion. He died on February 3, 1924

            1925 – Don’t touch your remote! John Logie Baird of Scotland conducted the first test of the working television system.  Baird and American Clarence W. Hansell patented the idea of using arrays of transparent rods to transmit images for television and facsimiles respectively. Baird's 30 line images were the first demonstrations of  television by reflected light rather than back-lit silhouettes.  His 1928 trans-Atlantic transmission of the image of a human face was a broadcasting milestone. Color television , in1928, stereoscopic television and television by infra-red light were all demonstrated by Baird before 1930. The credit as to who was the inventor of modern television really comes down to three different people in three different places both working on the same problem at about the same time: In addition to Baird, Vladimir Kosma Zworykin, a Russian-born American inventor working for Westinghouse, and Philo Taylor Farnsworth, a privately backed farm boy from the state of Utah. “Zworykin had a patent, but Farnsworth had a picture…” Zworykin is usually credited as being the father of modern television. This was because the patent for the heart of the TV, the electron scanning tube, was first applied for by Zworykin in 1923, under the name of an iconoscope. Farnsworth was the first of the two inventors to successfully demonstrate the transmission of television signals, which he did on September 7, 1927. So YOU figure out who invented television.

            1950 - Charles M. Schulz's comic strip Li'l Folks was accepted by United Features Syndicate, re-christened Peanuts and debuted in seven newspapers on this day.

            1956- The first atomic clock in the United States, the Atomicron, started ticking at the Overseas Press Club in New York City. The basis of the timing was the constant frequency of the oscillations of the caesium atom - 9,192,631,830 MHz. It was priced at $50,000. It came with a snooze control, 30 preset stations, sound effects such as “tropic rain forest”, gentle breeze, and toilet flushing. An atomic clock is a very precise clock that operates using the elements Caesium or Rubidium. A Caesium clock has an error of one second per million years.

            1959- The premier episode on CBS (Friday nights at 10:00) of The Twilight Zone, the anthology series of weirdness hosted by Rod Serling. In this first episode,Mike Ferris finds himself in a town strangely devoid of people. But despite the emptiness, he has the odd feeling that he's being watched... This is the original 1959 series, not the CBS The Twilight Zone (1985) version nor the UPN The Twilight Zone (2002) version. The last original episode aired on June 1, 1964. Rod Serling, who’s narrative introduction (actually there were several but the best ) was –“You're traveling through another dimension -- a dimension not only of sight and sound but of mind. A journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of imagination. That's a signpost up ahead: your next stop: the Twilight Zone!” In all, Serling wrote over eighty five episodes.

            1962 – Hereeeeeeerse Johnny!.  Johnny Carson made his debut has host of the Tonight Show on NBC.  Six months after Jack Paar made a stormy departure from "The Tonight Show" (over jokes about Communism, among other issues) and viewers enduring a succession of "substitute" hosts (and an ill-fated attempt at a magazine-type show), NBC finally settle on a permanent host. Opening night guests were Joan Crawford, Rudy Vallee and The Phoenix Singers. Carson would continue has host until May 22, 1992.

            1965 – Beethoven’s Ninth?, Mozart’s Eine kleine Nachtmusik, Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue? All pale musically to the genius of the McCoys’ Hang on Sloopy which reached number 1 on the Billboard Charts on this day.

            1968- The Wild and Scenic Rivers Act was passed by congress.  It established a National Wild and Scenic Rivers System and prescribed the methods and standards through which additional rivers would be identified and added to the system. The Act authorized the Secretary of the Interior and the Secretary of Agriculture to study areas and submit proposals to the President and Congress for addition to the system.  The act was sponsored by Sen. Frank Church of Idaho and signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson. Thus far,  a total of 156 rivers have wild and scenic status.

            1978 – The New York Yankees beat the Boston Red Sox 5-4 in a one game play off.  Shortstop Bucky Dent’s three run home run provided the margin of victory.

            1985 – Rock Hudson kaput. Born born Leroy Harold Scherer Jr., on November 17, 1925, in Winnetka, Illinois, was a Hollywood heartthrob – short on acting ability  - whose career in movies and TV spanned nearly three decades. Homosexuals were not looked on kindly in the Hollywood of the 1950s 60’s and 70’s. Hudson covered up with a pseudo marriage to his secretary in 1955. It lasted three years.  In 1984 he was diagnosed with AIDS.

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3         1226 – Death of St. Francis of Assisi (Giovanni Bernadone). He was 45 years old and had been preaching (and living the life he preached) for twenty years. In his life and preaching, Francis emphasized simplicity and poverty, relying on God's providence rather than worldly goods. The brothers worked or begged for what they needed to live, and any surplus was given to the poor. Francis was canonized by Gregory IX less than two years later on July 16, 1228. His feast day is celebrated on October 4.

            1613 - Tobacco was first successfully harvested for export by John Rolfe of the Jamestown Colony.  This variety, which seemed “smoother” than any other that England had ever tasted, became wildly popular. By 1614 Virginia had entered the world trade market protected under English laws. By 1620 tobacco was being used as currency in Virginia, a trade option that endured for two centuries Rolfe was also the future husband of Pocahontas.  

            1803- Happy Birthday, John Gorrie, American physician and early leader in the invention of the artificial manufacture of ice, refrigeration, and air conditioning. While he was a Naval officer stationed at Apalachicola Florida he needed ice to treat malaria patients with fever. He reasoned, fairly correctly, that  people living in cold climates never got malaria ( Prof. Sy Yentz suggests that perhaps they froze to death first) He built a small steam engine that drew heat from the brine. The chilled brine was used to cool air or make ice. He was granted the first U.S. Patent for mechanical refrigeration in 1851 and those are the Gorrie details.

            1830 – Happy Birthday, George Brayton, U.S. mechanical engineer and pioneer in the development of internal combustion engines. Braydon invented the continuous ignition combustion engine that later became the basis for the turbine engine.  The Patent Office identified George Brayton's 1872,.2-cycle engine as a hot-air engine that ran quietly with petroleum fuel. The Brayton Cycle became the basis for all gas turbine engines and he is believed to have manufactured the first gas turbines commercially in Providence, Rhode Island. For a while his hot air engine became the preferred engine of the American auto industry. You can see a  Brayton Engine  in the Smithsonian in the American History museum, and a later Brayton engine which powered one of John Holland's early submarines is preserved in the Great Falls Museum in Paterson, New Jersey.

            1844- Happy Birthday, Sir Patrick Manson, Scottish parasitologist, born in Old Meldrum, Aberdeenshire, who was the "father of tropical  medicine." His greatest achievement was to demonstrate conclusively what had long been suspected, namely, that certain diseases are transmitted by insects. His first success, in 1877, was to link the mosquito Culex fatigans with the presence of the parasite Filaria sanguinis hominis (FSH) in many of his patients suffering from elephantiasis.

            1863 – Three months after the victory at Gettysburg, expressing gratitude for the crucial Union Army defeat of Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia, President Abraham Lincoln announced that the nation would celebrate an official Thanksgiving holiday on November 26, 1863. The speech, which was actually written by Secretary of State William Seward, declared that the fourth Thursday of every November thereafter would be considered an official U.S. holiday of Thanksgiving. During the 1930s, President Franklin Roosevelt, with an eye on retail sales, tried to move it to the 3^rd Thursday in November but changed it back to the 4^th Thursday in 1941 following pressure from Congress.

            1895 - The Red Badge of Courage, by Stephen Crane, was published in book form. The story of a young man's experience of battle – Antietam- was the first American novel to portray the Civil War from the ordinary soldier's point of view. The tale originally appeared as a serial published by a newspaper syndicate. Crane contracted tuberculosis and died June 1900 at the age of twenty eight.

            1899 - The motor-driven vacuum cleaner was patented by J.S. Thurman of St. Louis, Mo. The vacuum cleaner had been patented by inventor Ives McGaffey who called it a  "sweeping machine" on June 8 1869. This was the first patent for a device that cleaned rugs. Thurman started a horse drawn (door to door service) vacuum system His vacuuming services were priced at $4 per visit He invented his gasoline powered vacuum cleaner, earlier in 1899 and some historians consider it the first motorized vacuum cleaner. Yes, this business truly sucked.

           1906- The second international conference on wireless telegraphy in Berlin adopted SOS as the official international distress signal, replacing the catchy call sign CQD developed by the Marconi Wireless Company in 1904. Other suggestions such as OH  DAMN !, WHOOPS!, and ARGGH! were all rejected.

            1910- British comedians Charlie Chaplin and Stan Laurel arrived in the United States on tour with Fred Carno’s famous British vaudeville company. The troupe broke up when Chaplin returned to Britain. Both later became silent film stars. Chaplin became a superstar comedian, actor and director.  Laurel teamed up with American Oliver Hardy briefly in 1919 and famously in 1926.

            1916- Happy Birthday, James Francis a ka Frank  Pantridge, Irish cardiologist who developed the life-saving portable defibrillator. He found out that death occurred within the first hour for 60% of males (up to middle-age) that suffered a heart attack, and of these, 90% suffered ventricular fibrillation. To begin earliest possible treatment, in 1965, Pantridge equipped an ambulance with a portable defibrillator. It achieved a 50% long-term patient survival rate.  Defibrillators, are used to apply an electric shock to the chest to overcome ventricular fibrillation, a typically fatal irregular rhythm of the heart.

            1922- The first fax was faxed as city telephone lines were used for the  transmission of a facsimile photo in Washington, DC. Charles F. Jenkins sent an image (Note: the fax was invented in 1843 by Alexander Bain of Scotland – yes before the invention of the telephone but after the invention of the telegraph) from 1519 Connecticut Ave to the U.S. Navy Radio Station NOF at Anacostia, D.C. The fax, a photo of  exotic dancer Babette La Touche…..no no no, it was of President Calvin Coolidge.

            1922 – Same day as the fax, Rebecca L. Felton, D-Ga., became the first woman member of the U.S. Senate. She was appointed, by Governor Thomas Hardwick to serve out the remaining term of the kaput Sen. Thomas E. Watson

            1941- The first aerosol can used in a commercial application was patented. It had been invented by two U.S. Dept. of Agriculture researchers, a chemist and an entomologist, L.D. Goodhue and W.N. Sullivan. They were looking for a way to apply oil-free insecticides in mushroom houses. The mushrooms, who had moved from a 3-bedroom condo to a split level ranch in Levittown, L.I were having trouble with ants.  Mr. Mushroom reportedly said, “now I’m a fungi but this is going too far”. It was their design that made products like hair spray possible.  In 1837, Parisian Antoine Perpigna invented a soda siphon incorporating a valve. Metal spray cans were being tested as early as 1862. They were constructed from heavy steel and were too bulky to be commercially successful. In 1899, inventors Helbling and Pertsch patented aerosols pressurized using methyl and ethyl chloride as propellants.  The first aerosol can was patented on November 23, 1927 by engineer Erik Rotheim

1944 – Happy Birthday, Pierre René Deligne, Belgian mathematician who was awarded the Fields Medal (mathematics equivalent of the Nobel Prize) at the International Congress of Mathematicians in Helsinki, Finland, in 1978 for his work in algebraic geometry. His work originated with André Weil's ideas on polynomial equations which led to three questions on what properties of a geometric object can be determined purely algebraically. These three problems quickly became major research challenges to mathematicians. A solution of the three Weil conjectures was given by Deligne. We like to put in these items (this, thanks to Today in Science History) because we have no idea what they mean but you’d have to be like, have a ginormous brain and be like totally smart to like, you know, understand what it totally means

1947- After 11 years of grinding and polishing a 200-inch diameter telescope lens for the Mount Palomar Observatory was completed at the California Institute of Technology. This lens, the first 200 “incher” to be made in the U.S., originated with 20 tons of molten glass at 2,700 ° Fahrenheit which was poured into a ceramic mold at the Corning Glass Works, NY in 1934. The glass lens was allowed to cool very slowly until it was room temperature. The telescope in which the lens was mounted was named the Hale Telescope in recognition of Dr. George E. Hale who had initiated the project. Hale had already built a 100-inch telescope in Mount Wilson, California. This 5-ton instrument remained the largest telescope in the world until the creation of the monster 200-inch Hale telescope. The tube alone of the 200-inch Hale telescope weighs 150-tons. The telescope was dedicated in 1948 and was first used on  February 1, 1949 by taking pictures of a certain Babette La Touche, an exotic dancer…….no we’re just kidding.  It took pictures of the Milky Way.

            1951 – At the Polo Grounds in Manhattan (long demolished), New York Giants third baseman Bobby Thomson hit a three-run home run off Brooklyn Dodger reliever Ralph Branca in the bottom of the ninth inning (the “shot heard round the world”) to win the deciding game of a three-game playoff series against the Brooklyn Dodgers, sending the Giants into the World Series…….where they would lose to the New York Yankees. The Dodgers took a 4-1 lead into the bottom of the ninth inning, and the Giants appeared doomed. The Scottish born Thompson’s home run made for a 5-4 victory.  The moment was immortalized by the famous call of Giants play-by-play announcer Russ Hodges who cried, "The Giants win the pennant! The Giants win the pennant!"

            1952- The first U.S. video recording on magnetic tape giving viewable results of off-air black and white recordings was made by John T. Mullen at the electronics division of Bing Crosby Enterprises in Los Angeles, Cal. Video taping was considerably less expensive that filming. In magnetic taping,  electrical signals from a television camera or television receiver are stored as patterns of magnetized regions of iron oxide on a plastic ribbon.  When the recorded tape is played back, the original signals are reconstructed. These signals can then be disseminated by broadcast antenna or by cable to television receivers that translate the signals into images and sounds.  And that’s how you can see Judge Judy!

            1955- A historic day for children’s TV programming, as Captain Kangaroo premiered on CBS and The Mickey Mouse Club premiered on ABC. Captain Kangaroo, Bob Keeshan, became the most successful children’s program of all time.  Keeshan had also played Clarabell the Clown on the Howdy Doody Show as well as Corny the Clown on his own Corny the Clown Show.  The Mickey Mouse Club was hosted by Big Mouseketeer, Jimmy Dodd and co-host Mooseketeer, Roy Williams.  While there seem to be hundreds of former child actors running around claiming to be mouseketeers, it appears that there were 39, kids on the first show 1955-59 and only 9 lasted the entire filming: Annette, Karen, Sharon, Doreen, Darlene, Cubby, Lonnie, Bobby, Tommy. The show only ran for 360 episodes. ABC wanted to run more ads and Walt Disney refused. His contract would not allow him to “shop”the show to another network

             1962- Five years minus one day after the launch of Sputnik, U.S Navy Commander Walter Schirra (brother of Kay Schirra Schirra - whatever will be will be….) orbited the Earth almost six times in the Project Mercury capsule, Sigma 7. Schirra’s was the fifth of the 6 Mercury flights.  The flight lasted almost nine hours. Schirra was the only astronaut to fly a Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo (see Oct. 11) mission.

            1981 - A hunger strike by Irish nationalists at the Maze Prison in Belfast in Northern Ireland was called off after seven months and 10 deaths. The first to die was Bobby Sands, the imprisoned Irish Republican Army (IRA) leader who initiated the protest on March 1, 1981. You can see a mural dedicated to them on the Falls Road in the Catholic section of Belfast.

            1985 – First flight of the space shuttle, Atlantis. Atlantis, the fourth orbiter to become operational at Kennedy Space Center, was named after the primary research vessel for the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute in Massachusetts from 1930 to 1966. This was the second Space Shuttle mission totally dedicated to the Department of Defense.  It lasted four days and was very secret.  All communications were in Esperanto and the crew wore false mustaches and glasses.

            1994- And on the same day (different year as the birth of the developer of the defibrillator, the Food and Drug Administration approved the Left Ventricular Assist Device, which helps failing hearts continue to function. The left ventricle is the large, muscular chamber of the heart that pumps blood out to the body. A left ventricular assist device (LVAD) is a battery-operated, mechanical pump-type device that's surgically implanted. It helps maintain the pumping ability of a heart that can't effectively work on its own.    The right ventricle civil rights association immediately sued, crying discrimination.

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 4        The finale of the naval battle of Lake Poyang  which had begun on August 31.  It was one of the final battles fought in the fall of China's Mongol-led Yuan Dynasty. There were at this time a number of rebel groups who sought to topple the reigning dynasty; the three most powerful were called the Ming, the Han, and the Wu. The navy of the Ming force, under Zhu Yuanzhang, met the Han navy, commanded by Chen Youliang, on Lake Poyang, China's largest freshwater lake. This battle was the largest naval battle of the medieval age and, by some definitions, the largest naval battle in history.  On this last day, the Ming employed fire ships , and at one point in the conflict Chen Youliang suffered an arrow through his skull and went kaput....similar to the death of the English King Harold at the Battle of Hastings in 1066. The Han surrendered shortly afterwards.

            1535- The first complete English translation of a printed Bible – the Matthew Bible was published. John Wycliff's hand-written manuscripts were the first complete Bibles in the English language (1380's). Wycliff (or Wycliffe), an Oxford theologian translated out of the fourth century Latin Vulgate. Gutenburg invented the printing press in the 1450's, and the first book to ever be printed was the Bible (